Please do not publicise this too widely, and if you're reading this page to get early access to our images BE AWARE that anything found there is not considered to be a released image and may be replaced without warning.

Our preferred list of tests to be run is below. Please take a test and run it. First priority: if you have uncommon (i.e. non-x86 hardware), please start testing that first! Otherwise, pick the first one that's not already claimed. If there's nothing that suits, please make up another test and add that then run it.

To claim a test, edit this page and add your name/nick next to it with a time in UTC and INPROGRESS. Once you're done, change INPROGRESS to SUCCESS or FAILURE. Let's try to avoid duplication of effort!

If you do need to list a failure report, please file a bug against installation-reports immediately and tell us more on irc. It's possible that we may need to rebuild some of the CDs or DVDs based on feedback here; other bugs found may just end up being listed in errata. Either way, we need to know ASAP.

Specific things we want to check for:

Boot time

Make sure that the boot menu comes up where applicable:

syslinux for i386 (CD boot)

syslinux for i386 (USB boot)

syslinux for amd64 via BIOS (CD boot)

syslinux for amd64 via BIOS (USB boot)

grub for i386 via UEFI (CD boot)

grub for i386 via UEFI (USB boot)

grub for amd64 via UEFI (CD boot)

grub for amd64 via UEFI (USB boot)

Make sure that the boot menu is functional:

is it visible properly (i.e. no graphics corruption etc.)?

can you scroll up and down?

can you select submenus?

On other platforms without menus, check that the image boots and displays startup text:

yaboot on powerpc

etc...

debian-installer

Check that the selected installation type starts up:

Text mode

Graphics mode (where appropriate)

Serial mode (where appropriate)

With speech assistance (where appropriate)

Select your own language and preferred keyboard layout etc.

feel free to try other langauges and layouts if you're comfortable with them; we really want to get good coverage of the common choices. will be covered already!

Choose whether to connect your test machine to the network or not. We want to test installation using:

just the contents of the CD images

with networking, but no extra mirrors specified (i.e. security.d.o only)

with access to a package mirror

If you do allow a net connection, note whether IPv4 and/or IPv6 worked correctly. Feel free to try a static networking setup instead of the default DHCP.

Set up user accounts as you normally would for any installation.

Try a variety of different filesystem layouts:

auto layout

guided

manual

Please try some different filesystems, and ideally some software RAID and LVM options too. Be aware that if you want to test encryption, it will take a *long* time to write random data to initialise things, so only set up a small LVM area unless you want to block the installation for (potentially) many hours!

Go through tasksel and pick a semi-random selection of the available tasks.

Make sure that there are appropriate tasks listed:

The desktop task will only appear if you have enough of the task available (i.e. a full CD/DVD etc. or you've added a network mirror)

"Standard system utilities" should always appear.

Note down what you selected, and make sure it all installs OK.

Finalising the installation: make sure that the appropriate bootloader installs correctly and let it reboot.

After installation

If you have a desktop, check it contains a reasonable-looking (if minimal!) set of programs.

If you have lots of time: while here, try to launch each application from the default menus and ensure they start; on the desktop's default panels (if any), check that all widgets are functioning. These bugs should be filed against the applications themselves.

Finally

Report back...!

List of wanted tests

If the field isn't specified please decide what option to use yourself and note it down for reporting.

If you are able to test more than one combination please pick the most obscure first. Likewise, if you can use IPV6 please do so as most people will typically use IPV4 with DHCP clients.

The aim is to get the best spread of all possible options so if you can test an encrypted file system on top of SW RAID and LVM please do!